A lot of our adult kids who are straying, what they don't want us is blabbing at every place. I don't. I don't think we, you know, put it on the social media feed. Please pray for Cindy. She just moved in with her boyfriend.
I don't think you do that. I think we have to make sure. Is this going to help? My relationship with my adult child, but at the same time, the adult child needs to know that I'm building my own circle of support that's going to have to help me through this process because I want to be a better parent. Exactly.
And you can be a good parent with a child who's violating values and straying from faith, and not agree with them. This is the thing. People think, well, should I shun my child because they're doing this ungodly thing? And I'm saying, no. Stay in the story.
But for us to stay in the story, we need the help. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson, and I'm Dave Wilson, and you can find us at familylifetoday.com. This is Family Life Today. We've got Jim Burns in the studio talking.
Look at this title. When your adult child strays, trading heartache for hope, boom!
Sounds like a fun day. Every listener just said, "Wait, wait, wait! Say it again." We're talking about adult children that stray. This is a huge topic. When we're talking to friends, this is something that people are like, "Tell me, help me, give me answers and hope." So we've got the expert.
Yeah, Jim Burns has been. Decades—it's been a long time you've been on here. Yeah, great to be with you, though. Yeah, well, the topic we're talking about—you know—you are going to be on the Love Like You Mean It cruise this year. Yes, excited to be there.
Yeah, and years ago, Bob Lapine and and Ann and I did a workshop for adult parents of adult kids, and it wasn't really when they stray. It was just like, let's talk about how do you, which is obviously a big. And you've written about that too. You've written about everything. I mean, you got so many books about everything.
But let me tell you this: first of all. We got there, and they're like, "We need a bigger room because there's so many people." So we got a bigger room. They've signed up, and then we did an open mic. Yeah, at the end Q and A, and you know what we heard, right? Right.
It was well. You said right here, heartache. Yeah. And so, why did you decide to write about?
Well, I actually wrote only out of the need because I wrote a book called "When Your Adult Child Strays." This time, but the time before, I was just talking about doing life with your adult children. Keep your mouth shut. The welcome mat out. Pretty much tells you the whole story. You know how many times I've used that line.
We have thousands of times given that book to so many people.
Well, what happened was there was only six. Pages on when your adult child strays, but all the questions. I didn't realize I would spend the rest of my life answering questions with deep heartache, deep confusion, estrangement, deconstruction of their faith, violating values, disagreements on politics. I mean anything.
So when you do the open mic, it's people are just willing to talk about it too, and then some whisper because they feel so much shame and pain. But the pain is deep, and they wear it everywhere, and it affects their marriages. It affects their life. It affects their spiritual life. It's the topic that they can't get past.
Right. And so I finally said, you know what? It is time to, to face this. And I didn't really want to because I liked write fun books. And this isn't a fun book.
This is maybe one of the harder books because it has it has a connection to the soul. And you know, Kathy and I, we don't think we did it all right. We have three daughters, so of course we've had no hormones or drama in our life. Of course, yeah, none, zero. Whoa.
But you know, our kids. They came back. They're great kids now, so we don't have that deep pain. But we also, and we cancel each other's votes out. One goes to a church that we wouldn't go to, you know, those kind of things.
So we get frustrated. But we've had to learn how to deal with. With and when they started, you know, violating some of our values, straying from our faith, that became very disturbing to us. Yeah, and do you think it's More prevalent today than it was 20 years ago, or I think it is because you see the when you look at statistics, you see more kids are walking away. For example, Gen Z, two amazing tracks.
One is Gen Z is coming back to church. I mean, I'm so excited! Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's amazing. Same time, there's twice as many atheists with Gen Z as even the millennials, which would be the next crowd.
So you're seeing both things happening at the same time, which a lot of times when there's renewal and revival, that does happen. To be honest with you. But in this case, I focused on the ones who are kind of walking away, straying.
Some of them do it very strong and very deliberate, and they're very angry, or they're angry at the church, they're angry at their parents, and others just sort of drift away. Yeah, yeah. I think especially after COVID, yeah, people just got out of the habit of going to church, and that just became a habit. And I've talked to so many parents that even adults that aren't going back. No, I, I know.
There's a very close person in my life. He goes. It's just so much more comfortable. Remember, we could sit and watch, and we'd drink coffee, and I have my little, you know, slippers, and I'm doing that. I said, "Well, don't you miss the community?" He said, "That's what I miss." And we see kids who are straying from their faith.
Adult kids, they're coming back because of community. You know, Dave. No offense, it's not the preaching all the time; it's the community. No, it's the preaching, Jim. It's always the preaching.
I am there for preaching, okay? But I am an old guy. But they come back, you know, for that community. But no, COVID hurt us. And and many churches have not bounced back.
Yeah, yeah. And Jim, you talk to all these parents. If you go deeper, what are they saying about themselves? Yeah. Well, I think they feel a lot of shame.
They say, "If only we would have prayed more as a family. If only we would have, you know, let the kids go to that mission trip instead of the vacation. If only." And they play the "if only" game. And a lot of it is blaming themselves. And parents are not defined by their adult kids' poor choices.
It's so. Hard not to do. I know. I know. You know.
And Kathy and I did that when our kids, you know, did this little bump. We were like, "Oh, wow!" You know, we should have prayed more. I thought, "What did we do wrong?" We actually prayed.
Okay, and it still didn't. There was still this moment, right? But they they feel so much guilt upon themselves and they lay it on themselves. And some people don't feel comfortable talking. We're talking about open mic.
Well, they will. Yeah, they're at an event, but some suffer in silence and think they're the only people in the church who have kids who have strayed. When in fact It's frankly almost a majority have a kid who has somehow violated violated their values. Wow. That's a lot.
I mean, so those parents that are wrestling with it, maybe in silence. What do you encourage them to do? Do they need to talk? Yeah, they do. And I call it in the book.
I talk about their circle of support.
So, circle of support that doesn't just happen. You have to lean into that.
So intentional. Like for Kathy and I, we weren't raised in the church, so we didn't have the whole Christian background stuff going, and so we knew pretty immediately we needed mentors. We needed mentors for our marriage. We needed mentors for parenting. We needed For our spiritual life, you know, whatever.
So we still have those, and like I was thinking about Terry and Sharon the other day, who are some mentors of us, and they have taught us how to be parents of adult children, and they've taught us how to be really good grandparents. And you know what? They don't even say, "Oh, we're Jim and Kathy's mentors." We just needed that, but we need peer support.
So I've been in a small group for. Twenty-five years. Yeah, I read in the book, and I'm like, "We're clones." Yeah, I have a group. Been that many years too, and they are my life. No, they are.
I'm a better husband, better father. I'm sure you are too. But that's the point. We need counsel. The Bible says very clearly, "Where there is no counsel, the people fall.
In the multitude of counselors, there is safety." Yeah. And for us, we have found that the church is a part of our circle of support. Yeah. So you know, our church service last week it was just awesome, and I hadn't seen my daughter there. We usually go the same service.
We have five services. And I called her and said, "Hey, you got to go. It's just, it's just amazing." She goes, "I was there. I know I didn't see you." But the point being is, that's a place for us to have community. Kathy walked out and she said, "I just love the people we talked to today.
You know, we love the service, we love the message, we love the worship.
So that is a part of our circle of support." What we did was we kind of had to point out, we need the circle of support if we're going to get through it.
So when our daughter, who's now amazing, but during a rougher Spot was I going to go tell my small group of guys, "Wow, she's messing up because I'm their kind of like mentor when it comes to parenting. They've read my books, right?" And no, I did. Guess what I got? I got grace and love and understanding, and that happened to my son. And you know, hang in there.
And what can we pray for you for? You know, most people don't have that. Twelve and a half percent of the population—this just came out—say that they don't have one best friend. Right. So we need people around us, especially men.
Dave, I remember you going to a pheasant hunt, and you came back home. You had all these men who a lot of them had adult kids, adult sons. But I remember you saying, "Wow, that was the most rich time." Yeah. And by the way, these were. Men, I didn't know.
I've got my guys in Detroit. We've sort of raised our kids together. Yeah, but these are guys. Yeah, that were donors to family life, and so it was a Dennis Rainey pheasant hunt. Yeah, I'm not a hunter.
Yeah, so I'm like, what am I doing? But I was just went and and it was just a weekend. But on Saturday night or Friday night, after we sort of got to know each other, says, let's just talk, and I think. Eighty-five to ninety percent of the room had adult children issues, and they were weeping. Yeah, and they—it was so beautiful to watch.
We've been together forty-eight hours, and there's a bond here. Yeah, and praying over them, and staying in touch after. But that community piece is so needed.
So many don't have it. No, you're right. They walk alone. We need to share our weaknesses. And again, you and I have.
We're you know we're talking about a great support system, and that has helped us. I'm a better person for being in that. But a lot of people don't have that support system, and it doesn't have to be a group of so many men or so many women. Right. But what we have to figure out is how do we develop that.
And I think the church is a good place to start. Yeah, I really do because I think the church today is is healthier. Church today says we don't have to act like we have it all together, and they're doing life together, and that's what we need. When our kids stray, when our kids violate our values, it doesn't change the kids; it changes us. But Jim, is there a violation there of our kids' trust when we share what's going?
How do you navigate that? I think you have to be careful because what. A lot of our adult kids who are straying, what they don't want us is blabbing it every place. I don't. I don't think we, you know, put it on the social media feed.
Please pray for Cindy. She just moved in with her boyfriend. I don't think you do that. Yeah, I really don't. But you are saying there is a select group of people that you trust, right?
Right. And eventually, even with our Becca, I said, "Hey, by the way, you know some of the struggles that that you are having." I actually went and talked to my guys about that. I hope I trust them with my life, and this guy, I trust him with. Your my life, yeah.
So she was grateful for that. To be honest, but I don't think we should violate that by blabbing it to everybody. I really don't. I think we have to make sure: is this going to help my relationship with my adult child? But at the same time, the adult child needs to know that I'm building my own circle of support that's going to have to help me through this process because I want to be a better parent.
Exactly. And you can be a good parent with a child who's violating values and straying from faith, and not agree with them. This is the thing. People think, "Well, should I shun my child because they're doing this ungodly thing?" And I am saying, "No, stay in the story." But for us to stay in the story, we need the help. Yeah, yeah.
We've traveled around the world, and I'm always amazed that families around the world bring incredible joy and impact. But they also really struggle with the same issues. But families make a difference in the world. Like a family centered on Jesus impacts everyone. That's why we do what we do every single day.
We're trying to help marriages and families here, there, around the world, find Jesus as the center of their marriage. And find hope, and then not just see their marriage transform, but transform their neighborhood. And let me invite you to join us in this mission. What's that mean? Pray for us.
We need your prayers. But also, I don't know if you know this, but this ministry is a donor-supported ministry. In other words, people give financially to make this happen, and we would love to have you as a partner because we can't exist without you. Without monthly partners reaching. Families for Jesus.
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And by the way, define stray. Yeah, what do you mean stray?
Well, it just means that they're not living with our. Faith values, or they're not living with the same values and morals that we lived with, and so they've stray could mean they've made a hard right turn, and they're going totally against. And that they've now you know changed their gender, changed all kinds of stuff. They're smoking pot every day, or they're drug addicts, or whatever it might be. They're in prison.
They could do terrible. Or it could mean just drifting. It really encompasses a lot, but it just means they're not like it was when we were, you know, when the kids were going to Sunday school. But I mean, I talk to so many friends and people like even kids living with their girlfriend boyfriend. Like that's such a common thing, and it's such an awkward place for parents even say, "Oh yeah, they're living together." And you see this face of shame.
No, no, it's the shame. You're you're right. You know what I say to people? Like a woman said to me, her daughter had moved in with the boyfriend at nineteen, lived in California where we live, going to school in Georgia. And she, the shame and the guilt, and they'd flown out there and had this big conversation.
And she said, "It's all I think about. It's all I talk about to her." And I said, "Well, does she know what you believe? Yes. Does she know how you feel?
Well, yes. Then you're going to have to broaden the relationship because this relationship doesn't sound like it's going to work.
So when it falls and fails, will she come to you as a safe person? She knows what you believe. Yeah. She knows what you feel. She knows the pain that she's causing you.
You don't have to." You know, being a one-topic parent. You've said it one time. She doesn't need to hear it every time you are together. No, exactly.
So she goes, "What do I do with that?" I go, "Well, what does she like to do? She likes to shop." Which I laughed because I have three daughters, so for some reason they like to do. I said, "Well, take her shopping. You know, don't even bring it up at this point, at least in the preachy, luxury way." And she goes, "That is the hardest thing." I said, "Well, I have scars on my tongue." I laughed so hard when I read that in your book. I've had to bite my tongue many times, but all of us have.
Yeah, we we don't have to walk on eggshells. And I think some parents hear that and they think, oh, well then you know we can't be ourselves. No, you can be yourselves, but don't lay that on them at this point because you want to be that welcoming, safe person. Who's the safest person in the room? It's the person who shows love.
Jesus led with love. When it was, you know, a prostitute, when it was a tax collector, we don't understand the tax collector how bad that was today. But from the context of the scripture, Jesus still led with love. He didn't compromise his values.
So I believe it's possible to not compromise your values, compromise your biblical values, and at the same time. Show a lot of love, and that means if they're living with somebody and they have a baby, then you be the kind of grandma that's amazing, and you win them that way. You're not going to win them by saying you're wrong and I'm right, and you know told you this your whole life exactly. And you probably are right. That's just it.
But don't keep pushing that. Our kids are amazing. We've all made mistakes. Dave and I have made mistakes. But I want to say it so bad.
Yeah, I want to say it. I'm like, don't you see? I could help your whole life, and to buy you. I'm literally hitting her under the dinner table. And I'm not saying it.
He can see. Like, I want to say it. We have this thought, like this will change everything. Oh, right, mom. Thank you.
I've never heard you say that before. But that part of allowing God to have that. I mean, I'm. I love your principle. Number one in your book, you are fired.
Your role as the parent must change. No, exactly, man. That's so true. You know, essentially, when you are talking about Jesus with tax collectors and sinners, I mean, it's all over the place. But Luke fifteen, where he's having a meal.
This is amazing passage about God's heart for the lost sheep and lost son. But when I preach that, I say this: I go, "Do you realize that because they're having a meal together, they liked him? Yeah, they knew he disagreed. They liked him. I'm like, Do people like you?
Non Christians, far from God. Do they like hanging around you as a Christian? Probably not. They feel judged. Same thing with our kids.
You know, they know what we believe. Do they like being at our table, or do they? Feel like it's always the one topic, parent, and they're going to come after me. No, you're exactly right, and you know we didn't have fun with our kids. You know, I did my PhD in traits of a healthy family, and one of the traits was on fun.
And you know, funny enough, I didn't get it from Christian research; I got it from the secular world, and it was always one of the top things: playing together, having fun together. What I've said to people is sometimes it's better instead of preaching at them and lecturing them. Go on a fishing trip with the boys. Go on a some kind of a fun trip, you know, with the girl, and just enjoy, laugh, giggle, whatever. And it brings you back together.
It's bonding. Yeah, it is. Then they feel more safe, and they feel more. You know, open. You know, to doing something like that.
I remember talking to one of our guests, and she was talking about her mom, and she was straying. She was doing things wrong, but she said, even in the midst of that, there was not one time that when my mom looked at me, she didn't look at me with delight in her eyes. And I remember stopping right there and thinking, that's a big deal. That is as a Teenage girl, she still felt like my mom delights in me, and I think that joy, that delight, our kids feel it when they're around us. No, they do.
You know what? I I just got goosebumps. I don't know if you can with your bald. I had a bald head. I don't.
I kind of felt the goosebumps because that is so critical. The lion. Show delight, show the love, and it's hard because you're mad and you're frustrated and you're upset and you're worried. Yeah, you're scared for them. We're playing this movie forward is not going to go well.
Things like that. The bottom line is this: when they've strayed and when they've fallen away from stuff, the bottom line is, do you still love me? That's the question that each adult child is saying. That's the question every child is saying. We all say that.
Sure, sure. Do you still love me? And I think, you know, that probably you were talking about the you know Luke fifteen chapter. Dave, where the prodigal son is coming in, and the you know the the father welcomed him, yeah. And the son was probably saying, "Do you still love me?" Right now, notice in that story because this is a part of the string with faith story, right, right, too.
He strayed from faith, definitely big, big, big, big, big time. He was feeding the pigs, and he was Jewish. That's not a good thing, son. Yeah, right.
So he comes back, but the elder son is mad. Yep. But notice what the father said. He said. To the elder son, all that I have is yours.
He didn't change the the consequences. The consequences he'd already given his younger son the money. Yeah, so he didn't change the consequences, but he said, you know, the son of mine was lost and now he's found.
So what we miss on that is tough love means you allow them to experience the. Circumstances in a negative way that they've lived without the consequences, sure. But you allowed them to experience that. But you can still show love. I am so sorry that I am not going to give you any more money because I already gave you half of my inheritance.
Yeah, but you are my son, and I love you. That's how we bring people back. I think much more than by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are. Yeah, or keep giving them because we want them to love us.
So you know what? I told you I wouldn't give you any more money, but here's more, hoping that you'll change.
Well, let's talk about that a little bit.
Well, you got to ask: Are you enabling dependency on you, or or helping? Helping you can help help your kids. I mean, we just helped our daughter get into a house, um, in a small way, and how beautiful that was. Yeah, you just you do that.
Okay, that's helping. But if we continued to make the payments as adults with, you know, her and her husband and the two grandkids, that's enabling. I was talking with a guy, who whose son had a heroin. Problem. And this man was a very wealthy man, and he said, "My son, I've put a something on his car, and I know where he goes.
And he goes into Los Angeles, where near by where we live, and that's where he gets his drugs. And I don't know how he pays for it because he, you know, he doesn't have a job." I said, "Well, do you give him an allowance?" He said, "Yeah, pretty good allowance." I said, "Well, that's where he's getting his. You're paying for his drugs." And this man was almost violently angry at me for saying that. He said, "I am not, you know, buying his drugs." And his wife kind of put her hand on his hand and kind of went, "You know, maybe we are." Well, what what what happened was they were enabling this son by by giving him so much money because the son and the son was spending it on heroin.
So, what we have to understand is we're not helping when we enable. If we enable our kids, they become entitled, and there's a failure to launch. When there's a failure to launch, a lot of times kids who have a failure to launch also we find that a lot of the failure to launchers are the strays or the ones who are kind of falling away too, and but they're dependent on mom and dad.
So that's the other side of it. We were talking about one way: don't give in. But then some of us just kind of keep enabling. That doesn't work. It doesn't work if they're addicted.
To drugs that doesn't work. If they're struggling with some immoral issue, it just we can't keep enabling them. Yeah, yeah. I mean that's got to be one of the hardest things to do. I mean, change the locks on your door.
Yeah, you know if they are destroying your house and reckoning. I mean, it's like I. I mean, how do you do that as a parent?
So hard. No, it's hard. You got to do it. That's where you need community. Yeah, that's where you need, and you need counseling.
Counseling, because you've got to learn how will this make it better if I change the locks? To be honest, it gets so bad in some situations where you need to. They stole from you. They, you know, they were coming in and doing your life's in danger. Right.
Well, we talk about it in the book. We talk about some of the things when it's really, really bad. Yeah. With that, we have to make sure though that we're getting the advice and counsel from people. People who know what they're talking about, because there's some crazies out there.
If you if you look at estrangement right now, 27 of the population has a family member who's estranged. And today, there's a whole group of even people in in therapy who are saying estrangement is a really good thing.
Now, when there's sexual abuse and all that, there there has to be a break for a bit. Jim, we've talked to so many. People that are experiencing that, both the parental side, yeah, where the parents aren't allowed to see the grandkids or the kids, but also we're talking to the kids. They're like, "I can't be around my parents," and they're not allowed to be around my kids. I know you're seeing that all the time too.
I would say every time I speak on it, there's somebody wanders up, you know, and I always hope for the best. I'm in a group, and I go, "Wait, these people don't have these issues," and then they cut. We see this at church. We took our kids to our grandkids to church against their will, and we just Thought that's what the Lord was leading us to do, and I'm saying, well, maybe you need to listen harder because you probably need to honor your kids, even though you don't agree with them. Yeah, and that's a tough one.
Man, oh man, is that a great conversation with Jim Burns. He always brings incredible wisdom. I walk away thinking I need to do some things better. Do you feel like that? This is a program you're going to want to share with a lot of people.
And we got two more days with them. And by the way, his book again is called When Your Adult Child Strays. You can get it at familylifetoday.com. Just click on the link in the show notes, and guess what? Tomorrow we're going to invite Ron Deal, who directs our blended ministry here at Family Life, to join this conversation.
So again, you don't want to miss it. With Jim Burns, we'll see you tomorrow. I don't know about you, but I need parenting help—not just sometimes, but most of the time.
So maybe you feel like that too. And we have resources to help you as a parent, and you can go to familylife dot com slash parenting help. Family Life Today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a Crew Ministry. Fifty years of helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.
